BU Alums Shine in 40 under 40
Seven recognized in Boston Business Journal’s annual list of top young execs
By Patrick Kennedy
Every year since 1998, the Boston Business Journal has chosen forty of the region’s “leaders of tomorrow” — up-and-coming executives, entrepreneurs, and innovators under the age of forty. This year, seven of the forty rising stars are Boston University graduates.
“No question, the high number of ‘40 Under 40’ winners is a tribute to the depth and breadth at BU and the important role BU plays in the regional economy,” says George Donnelly, BBJ editor.
Last month, the respected industry weekly printed a special supplement profiling the leaders. Donnelly tells readers that the list honors “the risk-takers, the deal-makers, the brilliant counselors” — those on the leading edge of the Boston-area economy (which, if it were a country’s, would be the twenty-second largest in the world).
Photo courtesy of Ross Capobianco.
Ross Capobianco (COM’96), thirty-seven-year-old president of Home Instead Senior Care, walked away from a six-figure salary at a tech firm in order to start Home Instead. He works sixty hours a week providing elderly clients with daily assistance — and independence. Home Instead, which lost money its first year, will post a $1 million profit this year. Capobianco received a master’s degree in business communication from COM.
Photo courtesy of Greg Ehret.
As a senior managing director at State Street Global Advisors, Greg Ehret (GSM’99) runs a brisk business in global exchange-traded funds (ETFs). Now thirty-six, Ehret was a researcher for the Republican National Committee in Washington, D.C., in the early ’90s. After earning an M.B.A. at the Graduate School of Management, he spent a year in Bermuda on an exploratory assignment for State Street before returning to handle the company’s fast-growing market in global ETFs.
Photo courtesy of Marlo Fogelman.
At thirty-five, Marlo Fogelman (LAW’97, GRS’98) is the principal of marlo marketing/communications. After getting a J.D. and a master’s degree in international relations, she took a job as a lawyer for Regan Communications. Within a few years, she’d struck out on her own; her company’s client list now includes Longwood Events and Savenors Market as well as nonprofits such as the Ellie Fund for Breast Cancer Research and the Boston Public Library.
Photo courtesy of Jennifer Harrington.
Jennifer Harrington (CFA’92) is a partner and director of client services at Trinity Communications, Inc. Fresh from the College of Fine Arts, where she earned a bachelor’s degree in art history, Harrington worked in a gallery on Boston’s Newbury Street before joining Trinity. She specializes in branding for clients such as the Seaport Hotel. The thirty-six-year-old also serves on the boards of the Copley Society of Art and ACG Boston and is raising three children with her art-teacher husband in Bedford.
Photo courtesy of Girish Navani.
In 1999, Girish Navani (ENG’91) co-founded eClinicalWorks, a software company that saves thousands of small-practice physicians and their patients time and money with programs that allow for more efficient access to medical records. Already, eClinicalWorks is the market heavyweight. Company president Navani, thirty-nine, holds a master’s degree in mechanical engineering from the College of Engineering as well as a bachelor’s in mechanical engineering from Gujarap University in India.
Photo courtesy of Serena Powell.
Serena Powell (SAR’97) is the executive director of Community Work Services (CWS), a vocational nonprofit organization that places long-unemployed clients — most with disabilities or addictions — in steady jobs. Working with the Massachusetts Lodging Association, the Downtown North Business Association, and other business groups, CWS has trained and put to work hundreds of formerly homeless men and women. Powell, thirty-seven, has a master’s in rehabilitation counseling from Sargent College of Health and Rehabilitation Sciences.